Knicks close to landing 7-footer Andrea Bargnani from Raptors

Amare' Stoudemire will not have to worry about going up against Andrea Bargnani, right, next season if the deal for the Raptors 7-footer goes through.

In the moments after he’d made his draft pick, Knicks general manager Glen Grunwald was asked about the off-season strategies for the free-agent market and even with the salary-cap restrictions, Grunwald wasn’t about to rule out any possibilities.

“Well, we’ll let it play out,” Grunwald said. “It was crazy, things happened the last couple years that I didn’t think were going to happen and they may happen again. We just have to let it play out. We have to be opportunistic. We have to be ready.”

The words proved prophetic as the capped-out Knicks moved close to a trade Sunday, one that can be viewed as anything from a disastrous move to a game-changing steal. The Knicks are close to acquiring 7-foot forward Andrea Bargnani from the Toronto Raptors in exchange for Steve Novak, Marcus Camby, a 2016 first-round pick and a pair of future second round picks.

The deal needed league approval prior to midnight because of salary cap provisions. But even though an NBA source said, “Both teams want it to happen,” the Knicks and Raptors could not solidify the fine print and at midnight the salary figures changed to 2013-14 numbers — and now the deal will need to be reconstructed. The problem for the Knicks is they have only seven players under contract.

The deal is expected to be completed soon and, as Grunwald said in discussing the possible roster moves, the Knicks will have to let this one play out to find out just how it will work. Bargnani was the first overall pick in the 2006 NBA Draft, an intriguing blend of size and skill. Even now, a look at his numbers show a 15.2 points per game scoring average and a deft touch from long range.

But Bargnani, who was limited by injuries and ineffectiveness to just 35 games last year and 31 the previous season, became an albatross to the struggling Raptors franchise — and two front office regimes made little secret of their desire to dump him.

Bargnani’s time in Toronto peaked in the 2010-11 season in which he averaged 21.4 points per game. The Knicks certainly didn’t make this deal based on his production against them as they saw him on the floor for just under 25 minutes in two games and he connected for one field goal and didn’t grab a single rebound. And even in Toronto he was loudly booed by the home crowd at every mention of his name.

The Knicks will slightly add payroll in the following two seasons with Bargnani due $10.75 million next season compared to approximately $8.6 million for Novak and Camby and then $11 million the following season for Bargnani. But his contract is up at that point and Novak has one more year, so the Knicks will subtract just under $4 million from their 2015-16 payroll

If healthy, the Knicks could benefit from Bargnani, particularly with the free-agent period beginning Sunday at midnight. The Knicks are facing the possible loss of last year’s second-leading scorer, J.R. Smith, as well as Chris Copeland and Pablo Prigioni. James White was waived Sunday.